Diet During Chemotherapy: Hi everyone... - Advanced Prostate...

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Diet During Chemotherapy

MelaniePaul profile image
12 Replies

Hi everyone.

So today I am writing to you with a very practical question.

For those of you who are on Docetaxol, what kind of diet do you find best? Do you leave out certain things or add certain things more?

Thus far, I have only found out a lot about foods that support a healthy liver function such as green leaves, broccoli, grapefruit, etc.

Mel.

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MelaniePaul
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Blair77 profile image
Blair77

My husband will start his 5th cycle this week. His diet hasn't really changed except his tastebuds have been effected so food tastes rather bland. He has added more seasoning to try and combat this. At times he doesn't eat much because he says the food has no taste. This seems to subside around day 12 or so and then he eats normally until it hits again the next cycle. He hasn't lost any weight though so that's good 🙂

JamesAtlanta profile image
JamesAtlanta

I agree with Blair77's comments about loss of taste. Same thing happened to me.

I did not alter my diet, except drinking a lot of SmartWater. Staying hydrated is very important during chemo and it helps a lot. For some reason, SmartWater just tasted better to me and was easier to drink during chemo than other waters.

With regards to diet, I try to follow the recommendations from the book "The Anti Cancer Diet - A New Way of Life", by David Servan-Schreiber. Very helpful insight into the foods we should eat, with specific recommendations for PCa patients. It is also a very interesting story.

Hope this is helpful. Good luck with the chemo! We are all praying for a great reaction to it! 😊

Mel,

Hoping for the best for Paul.

I have found that eating small meals more often is helpful so you can eat less at one sitting. Having a big meal and very full stomach is something you want to avoid. I find that with a little something in my stomach I have less nausea.

I'm trying to eat healthy which I always have done. Eating a lot of fresh vegetables and fruits, salads, whole grains, yogurt. Sticking with chicken and fish, cutting back on the red meats, although I still have them occasionally.

For what it's worth: My wife's uncle had stage 4 prostate cancer and they got no treatment except for modifying their diet to only raw foods, mainly fruits and vegetables. They insisted that cancer can not live on raw foods. He lived for 6 years doing that. I'm not going to that extreme, but I figure that adding a lot of healthy raw fruits and vegetables is probably a good idea.

I haven't found problem with taste, but I recommend going easy on the salt. I have swelling in my ankles and legs sometimes, probably a combination of chemo and high temperatures (it's just over 41 C. here today). Keeping the salt low helps and of course make sure to drink plenty of water. I am drinking around 5 glasses per day.

Let us know how it goes, we're here to help and support our brothers and sisters here.

rococo profile image
rococo in reply to

I agree. Also eat slowly and chew thorouly to get those digestive juices going. The best. Rocco

MelaniePaul profile image
MelaniePaul

Thank you all. Very helpful.

We will just stick with our normal diet for now and see how it goes. Veg and fruit we have anyway, and eating little but often is the only way my husband can do it anyway.

Off to the hospital now.

Mel.

rococo profile image
rococo

Don't forget dandelion and artichoke. I also take standardized milkthisle but lam not doing chemo. Hope you the best. Rocco

eggraj8 profile image
eggraj8

I am at the 9th round of Chemo. Taste is lost so spicy things give flavor. You also should not eat fresh vegetables since they may contain bacteria and you will have a low white blood cell count between chemo treatments. All fruits should be washed before eating. I wash bananas, apples, oranges, etc. with seventh generation liquid soap before eating. No berries unless completely cooked. Also avoid any salad bars as lots of people touch the food.

I have found citrus fruits and salty foods along with some hot sauce gives the food taste. I eat a lot of cooked apricots and prunes since I wind up with constipation as a result of the chemo. This would not work with others as I understand diarrea is often a problem.

pjoshea13 profile image
pjoshea13

Mel,

The problem with aggressive therapies is that resistance starts to kick in very quicky. This is true both for radiation & for chemo. But there are phytochemicals that may block the cell signaling pathways involved in resistance.

Curcumin is one of those. There have been cell studies, but I'll just mention an ongoing French Phase II study:

"Multicenter Study Comparing Taxotere Plus Curcumin Versus Taxotere Plus Placebo Combination in First-line Treatment of Prostate Cancer Metastatic Castration Resistant (CURTAXEL) (CURTAXEL)"

clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show...

No results yet, but worth trying. I use Longvida:

swansonvitamins.com/now-foo...

Two other phytochemicals of likely benefit are resveratrol & genistein.

For resveratrol, I use:

revgenetics.com/nitro250-su...

-Patrick

Dan59 profile image
Dan59 in reply to pjoshea13

Patrick , Your research is so spot on, I get new ideas everytime I read one of your post, Thank You!

MelaniePaul profile image
MelaniePaul in reply to pjoshea13

Hi Patrick.

Thank you for sending me those links. We will have a look into them.

Mel.

Dan59 profile image
Dan59

Mel, Excellent post by all here, I just wanted to remind you to be careful with Grapefruit, It can increase the dose of some meds used in APC and make them more toxic. I wish you the best.

Dan

MelaniePaul profile image
MelaniePaul

Hi Nalakrats.

Thank you, too, for your post.

Yes, Paul has small meals but often. Drinks a lot of water and green tea and fennel tea.

I make soup a lot. I don't like my own soupe, but he loves it, so I make one usually from carrottes, broccoli, peas, potatoes and add lots of stock, cinnamon, sage and ginger and pepper.

Mel.

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